Pilot Ordered Not To Land Command To `Go Around` Came Too Late For Flight 191

August 6, 1985|By Michael Connelly and Robert McClure, Staff Writers

DALLAS — The pilot of Delta Air Lines Flight 191 did not acknowledge a flight controller`s frantic order to abort his landing just before the jumbo jet crashed and burned, killing 134 people, investigators said Sunday.

But by the time the order was given, the L-1011 already had hurtled to the ground 1,700 feet short of the runway and careened across a perimeter highway in an intense thunderstorm.

The air traffic controller had ordered the Delta flight to slow down its approach to Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport because it was following too closely behind a Lear Jet that had just landed, said Patrick Bursley, the National Transportation Safety Board member in charge of the investigation of Friday`s crash.

The controller told investigators he saw the Delta jet come out of the clouds at a very low altitude, perhaps 100 to 150 feet above the ground, Bursley said.

``Delta, go around,`` the controller ordered, meaning the pilot was to pull out of the descent and circle the airport.

``He saw the plane was very low,`` Bursley said of the controller, who was not identified. ``It concerned him so much he told them (to) go around.``

But by the time the order to go around was given, the plane apparently had already struck the ground short of the runway and careened across Highway 114, striking two cars before hitting a water storage tank.

The aircraft shattered when it hit the ground, Bursley said.

``He saw fire on the left side and then he saw ground contact,`` Bursley said of the controller.

The engines were at full power at the moment of impact, but it was not clear whether the pilot was attempting to pull out of the descent, investigators said.

The L-1011 crashed with 161 passengers and crew members on board. The death toll rose to 134 Sunday. Investigators searching the strewn rubble discovered another body -- that of an unidentified adult -- beneath heavy debris.

Officials also identified another victim, Ross Kerr of San Francisco, whose name had been withheld until his family was notified.

Bursley said the wind shear alert system at the airport failed to activate until after the Lockheed crashed. Several reports said it was 12 to 14 minutes between the crash and the system`s activation, Bursley said.

Federal officials said Sunday that wind shear, a phenomenon characterized by sudden change in wind speed and direction, may have been the most likely cause of the crash.

About 20 investigators continued to search the airport approach Sunday. Hundreds of flourescent pink and blue flags marked the location of plane fragments, some as small as nuts and washers.

Federal investigators said they were continuing to reconstruct the sequence of events that led to the crash by studying taped conversations between Flight 191`s crew and air traffic controllers.

They also were interviewing controllers and the flight crews of other aircraft that landed immediately before and after the crash. The tapes from the flight`s recorder also have been reviewed.

Flight 191 crashed at 7:05 p.m. EDT during a blinding storm accompanied by hail and high winds. The jet crashed into two cars on Highway 114 as it made its approach to runway 17.

Early Sunday, workers still were gathering personal effects from the crash site.

By late Sunday, pathologists at the Dallas County Institute of Forensic Sciences had positively identified 32 of the bodies. The pathologists, working in 10 two-man teams, had completed initial studies of all the bodies.

At the morgue situated next to Parkland Memorial Hospital, where many of the crash survivors were hospitalized, officials set up what was called the ``Delta Command Post`` -- a room complete with a computer being used to help identify victims.

On the walls of the room were charts with numbers assigned to the recovered bodies and notations on size, probable age, and sex.

Identifications were being made by physical descriptions, fingerprints, dental records and materials found at the crash site. Chief Medical Examiner Charles Petty said no family members had viewed bodies as a means of identification.

``That will be one of our last resorts,`` Petty said.

Officials said everybody that could be fingerprinted was printed, and they were being compared to stacks of prints provided by family members, the armed forces, the FBI and other sources.

Fingerprints have been used to identify four bodies, including a 4-year-old boy whose parents had recently had the boy fingerprinted as part of an anti- kidnapping program.

Two floors above the command post, a team of eight FBI agents worked on the comparison of victims` fingerprints to available records. But some of the bodies were too damaged or burned for prints to be taken, officials said.

``It`s a grim situation,`` said FBI agent Dan Greathouse. ``The impact injuries are bad, but they don`t give us nearly the problem of severe burning.``